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Few Free Agent Groundballers Remain

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When MLBTR's Tim Dierkes took stock of the free agent groundballers at the outset of the 2010-11 offseason, the pickings were slim. Fast forward three months and Jake Westbrook, Jorge de la Rosa, Jon Garland, Hiroki Kuroda, Brad Penny and Brandon Webb have all signed.

Carl Pavano, who is reportedly closing in on a deal with the Twins, and Jeff Francis are the only remaining free agent starters (minimum 50 IP) with above-average ground ball rates. Pavano posted a 51.2% ground ball rate last year, while Francis posted a 46.8% ground ball rate.

Though it doesn't seem likely that he'll pitch in 2011, Andy Pettitte posted a respectable 43.9% ground ball rate last year. Jeremy Bonderman, a candidate to replace Pettitte in New York's rotation, also hovered around the league average and posted a 44.7% rate. 

Why all the fuss about ground balls? Orioles president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail has said before that you can't hit a ground ball out of the park. Fly balls are another story, however.

After MacPhail traded for Kevin Millwood last offseason, the veteran posted a career-low ground ball rate and a career-high fly ball rate in hitter-friendly Camden Yards. Otherwise, Millwood's numbers weren't all that different from Jake Westbrook's in 2010. The right-handers, both in their mid-thirties, pitched close to 200 innings apiece with about 6.0 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9 last year.

But Millwood allowed considerably more fly balls than Westbrook, who kept the ball on the ground. The result: 30 home runs allowed by Millwood (Westbrook allowed 20), an ERA nine tenths of a run higher than Westbrook's and, almost certainly, far less guaranteed money in free agency.

Olney On Qualls, Balfour, Damon, Pavano, Soriano

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Ivan Nova, Craig Kimbrel and Madison Bumgarner are among the young players who will play major roles in determining their teams’ fates in 2011, as ESPN.com’s Buster Olney points out. Here are the rest of Olney’s rumors, with the latest updates up top:

  • Olney hears that Chad Qualls is looking to re-establish his value with a one-year deal (Twitter link). With all due respect to Qualls, finding a mutliyear deal might never have been an option, since he posted a 7.32 ERA and allowed 85 hits in 59 innings last year.
  • Teams believe Grant Balfour's asking price is dropping, according to Olney (Twitter link).
  • Once Jim Thome signs, other first base/DH types will likely follow. There are lots of them out there, as MLBTR’s Free Agent Tracker shows. Vladimir Guerrero, Jason Giambi, Russell Branyan, Johnny Damon, and Manny Ramirez are still available.
  • Olney says Damon “probably made a mistake in not following up on the Yankees' overtures last winter about a two-year deal.”
  • Carl Pavano and the Twins continue to make progress toward a deal and the sides could reach an agreement by the end of the week.
  • Rafael Soriano is prioritizing money over his 2011 role, Olney writes. Olney suggests that “if some club was willing to pay him to be its bullpen catcher for $45MM over the next three years, Soriano would consider it.”

Yankees Will Not Surrender First Round Pick

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Yankees GM Brian Cashman says he intends to hold onto his 2011 first round draft choice, according to Chad Jennings of the Journal News. That means the team won’t sign any of the three remaining free agents tied to draft pick compensation: Rafael Soriano, Carl Pavano and Grant Balfour.

“I will not lose our No. 1 draft pick,” Cashman said. “I would have for Cliff Lee. I won’t lose our No. 1 draft pick for anyone else.”

Since Soriano, Pavano and Balfour turned down their teams’ offers of arbitration after being ranked as Type A free agents, clubs have to surrender a top 2011 pick to sign them. The Yankees’ first round pick (31st overall) is unprotected.

Though the Yankees were in contact with Soriano and agent Scott Boras, they are not pursuing him. It's hardly shocking to hear that the Yankees are out on Pavano, who spent four injury-plagued seasons in the Bronx and earned nearly $40MM in the process.

Carl Pavano Rumors: Thursday

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We heard yesterday that the Nationals last spoke to Carl Pavano’s agent at the Winter Meetings and that the right-hander is talking a lot with the Twins about a potential deal. The Pirates and Royals are also options for Pavano. Here’s the latest:

  • The Nationals are not actively pursuing Pavano, according to Ben Goessling of MASNSports.com. Washington isn’t having serious internal discussions about the pitcher and the team isn’t likely to sign him unless his asking price drops.
  • The Pirates have mild interest in Pavano, but will not set the price for him, according to Rob Biertempfel of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (on Twitter).

Twins Closing In On Deal With Pavano

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JANUARY 14TH: The team is still trying to sign Pavano and hopes to have an answer over the next week, GM Bill Smith told Joe Christensen of the Star Tribune (via Twitter).

JANUARY 6TH: The Twins are nearing an agreement on a two-year deal with free-agent pitcher Carl Pavano, tweets Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports. The sides are making "solid progress" and should have the deal completed soon, tweets LaVelle E. Neal III of the Star Tribune.

The Nationals were rumored to have interest in Pavano, but Washington didn't make a strong push for the righty, tweets Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post. He was interested in pitching for the Rockies, tweets Troy Renck of the Denver Post, but Colorado's interest tapered off after it re-signed Jorge De La Rosa.

Pavano, who will turn 35 on Saturday, pitched for the Twins in 2010 after they acquired him from the Indians in a midseason trade in 2009. Pavano rejuvenated his career last season (and, to a lesser extent, in '09) after an injury-riddled stint with the Yankees from 2005-08. In 2010, he posted a 3.75 ERA with a 4.8 K/9 and 1.5 BB/9 in 221 innings. He signed a one-year deal with Minnesota prior to last season.

The Twins have been hit relatively hard by free agency so far this offseason, losing Orlando Hudson, Matt Guerrier and Jesse Crain, but the potential return of Pavano would keep their strong starting rotation intact.

Pavano “Talking A Lot” With Twins; Pirates, Royals Are Options

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Carl Pavano is "talking a lot" with the Twins about re-signing with the club, reports SI.com's Jon Heyman (Twitter link).  Most of the Pavano rumors this winter have centered around the Nationals showing interest in the veteran starter, but given Pavano's stated desire to return to Minnesota, it's possible the Twins were just biding their time to gauge the market for the free agent.  In an MLBTR poll taken last month, close to 46% of respondents predicted Pavano would re-sign with the Twins, and it's safe to say Minnesota is still the front-runner.

Between Milwaukee acquiring Zack Greinke, Texas turning their attention to the lineup by signing Adrian Beltre, and Detroit's lack of interest, it seemed like the Pavano market had shrunk to just Minnesota and Washington.  Heyman's tweet, however, lists the Pirates and Royals as "other options" for the right-hander.  This isn't the first we've heard of Pittsburgh possibly being interested in Pavano, but the Royals are a new suitor, though they're known to be looking for pitching to replace Greinke's innings. 

Pavano ending up in either Kansas City or Pittsburgh would be, to say the least, a surprise.  If one of the two teams gives him the three-year contract he's looking for, however, the extra guaranteed year could be enough to sway Pavano to join a team that isn't likely to contend over the lifetime of the deal.  The Pirates and Royals might see a Pavano signing as a bellwether move to announce to players and agents that the small-market clubs are ready to be active in the market, though it could be argued that just being active in bidding achieves that same goal.

Nationals Rumors: Free Agents, Lee, Pavano

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The challenge for the Nationals, writes Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post, is convincing elite players to come to D.C. Zack Greinke, Jorge de la Rosa and Derrek Lee are among the players who declined Mike Rizzo’s overtures this offseason; the GM says luring players to Washington isn’t easy.

"It shows the difficulty of trying to build something," Rizzo said. "The only thing that convinces players to come is winning. It's the chicken and the egg. Which comes first? Do you win and then the players come, or do the players come and then you win?"

The Nationals have agreed to deals with top free agents like Jayson Werth and Adam LaRoche this offseason. But the team faced rejection along he way.

“We liked [Derrek] Lee a lot,” Rizzo said. “I don't know why he went to Baltimore over us."

The Nationals have been linked to Carl Pavano for months, but Rizzo says he hasn’t talked to the right-hander at all. The Nationals last spoke to agent Tom O’Connell at the Winter Meetings, so they don’t appear to be frontrunners. Conflicting reports about the Nationals’ interest in Pavano emerged yesterday.

NL Notes: Pavano, Young, Cubs, Brewers

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Some notes from the senior circuit…

  • Carl Pavano is still "entertaining interest" from a handful of teams according to MASNSports.com's Ben Goessling. The Nationals remain very much in that mix, and Goessling's source indicates that there is no timetable for Pavano's decision.
  • Meanwhile, Adam Kilgore of The Washington Post gets the sense from team officials that the Nats are "lukewarm" on Pavano (Twitter link). He says not to expect a deal until Pavano's asking price comes down.
  • ESPN's Buster Olney tweets that the Mets' offer to Chris Young "likely includes guaranteed money over $1 million." A team offical said that yesterday's Chris Capuano pickup will not take the team out of the running for other free agent starters.
  • The Cubs are not planning to upgrade at second base, according to Jon Paul Morosi of FOX Sports (via Twitter). That makes it unlikely that they'll pursue Michael Young.
  • The Brewers have signed right-hander Jesus Sanchez to a minor league deal, reports Baseball America's Matt Eddy (on Twitter). The 23-year-old posted a 2.99 ERA with 5.8 K/9 and 2.3 BB/9 in 129 1/3 Single-A innings for the Phillies last season. They originally acquired him from the Yankees in the Bobby Abreu trade, back when Sanchez was a catcher.
  • Eddy tweets that the Brewers also signed outfielder Brandon Jones to a minor league deal. The 27-year-old hit .231/.333/.325 in the minors last year, bouncing from the Braves to the Pirates to the Tigers.

Rangers Notes: Pavano, Beltre, Young

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A few Rangers-related tidbits..

Heyman On Crawford, Pavano, CarGo

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There’s word that many Angels people were in favor of offering Carl Crawford a seven-year deal worth $142MM or so, according to Jon Heyman of SI.com. The Red Sox won the bidding for the All-Star left fielder with a $142MM offer that left the Angels without one of their offseason targets. Owner Arte Moreno has said that his team never made Crawford an offer, but he acknowledged the Angels' interest. Here are the rest of Heyman’s rumors:

  • There are thought to be one or two teams looking at Carl Pavano other than the Twins and Nationals, according to Heyman. The Mariners and Rangers have been linked to Pavano this winter, but it's not clear if those clubs are currently interested.
  • Heyman reports that the Rockies are still trying to lock up Carlos Gonzalez. Meanwhile Troy Renck of the Denver Post hears that the Rockies could move closer to an extension with the 25-year-old this week 
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